USA – Chibona, the US-based Greek yogurt business has named its long serving chief marketing officer, Peter McGuinness as the company’s new president.

In his new role, McGuinness will add to his current responsibility for overseeing Chobani’s demand function to also include supply chain, manufacturing, sustainability and research & development.

The US yogurt maker has also announced the departure of chief financial officer Mick Beekhuizen, who will be replaced on an interim basis by current treasurer Michelle Brooks.

Chobani Founder and chief executive officer Hamdi Ulukaya said McGuinness appointment and new roles will enable the company to simplify its structure to improve efficiencies.

Chobani said it is continuing its efforts to shift towards a nimbler, team-centric way of organising – a model that was tested through the combination of the company’s sales, marketing and new product development functions under McGuinness in 2017.

“I think this is what a modern food company should be. I don’t think you should be matrixed or siloed or layered or hierarchical. We are trying to be more team-centric, collaborative and less layered to grow more and innovate more.

“Peter has been an amazing member of that journey, and I’m honoured and happy to have him as president.

“Passion, intelligence and collaboration make us who we are, and I love seeing this talent rising up through the company, working side by side to build the future of Chobani,” Ulukaya added.

As part of the restructuring, the company has appointed Federico Muyshondt as the new chief customer officer, which will involve category development, shopper marketing and revenue and trade management.

In addition, Parag Agrawal was also promoted to the position of chief information officer, Grace Zuncic, as the chief people and culture officer while Jason Blaisure will report to McGuinness as the senior vice president of supply chain, reports Food Navigator.

The restructure comes at a time when the yogurt category overall has been struggling, although McGuinness was conifedent that Chobani’s core yogurt business has remained strong propelled by its innovations.

The company recently launched new products including Gimmies, Less Sugar Greek, a line of plant-based coconut yogurt and the new nut-butter-infused yogurts that began rolling out less than a month ago.

McGuinness said, Chobani is also set to launch and expand into several other new categories the company has never been in before – beyond yogurt.